Page 48 of The Friend Request

I’ve slipped into the kitchen to fetch more paper plates and a roll of bin bags because somebody’s knocked Ribena across the tablecloth. My head’s in the cupboard, and I’m rooting behind the baking trays, and when I turn around Ross is standing in the doorway with his hands in his pockets.

My stomach drops through the floor.

‘What are you doing?’ I say.

He doesn’t answer straight away. He glances back over his shoulder towards the living room, where Alex is talking over the music, Olivia’s shrieking about something, and there’s the heavy thump of one kid jumping off the sofa. He steps inside and lets the door swing shut behind him. The latch catches with a soft click.

The noise from the party dims to a muffled beat of bass and laughter.

‘I just want to talk,’ he says.

‘Then talk in there.’ I nod towards the door. ‘With everyone else.’

‘You know I can’t do that.’

I put the plates down on the worktop because my hands have started trembling and I don’t want him to see. The kitchen smells of warm cake and tuna sandwiches, and the fluorescent strip light above the sink is buzzing the way it always does when it’s been on too long. A stack of birthday cards is propped against the toaster. A half-empty bottle of Prosecco is sweating a ring on to the worktop. Everything about this room is mine. My house. My kitchen. My family behind that wall.

So why does it feel like I’m the one trespassing?

‘Ross,’ I say, and I keep my tone low because Alex is barely twenty feet away, ‘you need to leave me alone.’

He tips his head, and there it is, that look he used to give me when we were sixteen and I’d said something he thought was funny but wouldn’t admit to finding funny. Half a smile. One side of his mouth. It used to make me feel like the cleverest person in the room.

Now it makes me feel sick.

‘I’m not doing anything wrong,’ he says. ‘I came because I was invited.’

‘You were invited to the party, but you didn’t have to come. And I don’t want you in here.’ I hate that my voice is wobbling.

‘It’s a kitchen, Kim. People go into kitchens.’

‘Don’t do that.’

‘Do what?’

‘Make me sound ridiculous.’

He drops the half-smile, and for a second he just looks at me. Not charming, not guarded. Just looking, the way you’d look at someone across a waiting room when you’ve both been there too long.

‘I’m not trying to make you sound anything,’ he says. ‘I came today because I wanted to talk to you. That’s it. Five minutes, then I’ll go back in there and eat cake and clap along and leave when everyone else does.’

‘You shouldn’t have come at all.’

‘Probably not.’

‘Why have you been doing this to me?’

‘Doing what?’

I shake my head, anger replacing fear. ‘You know what! The messages, the threats, the following me in the dark! You realise I’m one step away from calling the police?’

The confusion on his face disarms me.

‘Threats? What are you talking about, Kim?’ He shakes his head. ‘And I’ve apologised for that night in town. I didn’t mean to scare you. I’d never want to scare you.’

‘Stop it,’ I say, trying to stay resolute but faltering in the face of his act. God, he’s good. He’s almost convinced me I’ve imagined the past few weeks. But the evidence is right there on my phone.

We stand there, and I can hear the party carrying on through the wall – someone turning the music up, a child I don’t recognise squealing, Olivia’s voice cutting through it with that sharp laugh she does when she’s showing off for her friends. My daughter. Growing up so fast it makes my heart hurt when I think about it, and I should be in there with her right now, not in here with the one person who could blow my entire life wide open if I let him get close enough.